Three Benedictine University students were named the top prize winners in an essay contest conducted in conjunction with the fall visit of Kevin F. Quigley, Ph.D., the 2009 Woodrow Wilson Visiting Fellow.
Quigley, a former Peace Corps volunteer and current president and CEO of the National Peace Corps Association, presented a lecture on President Obama’s service agenda. The contest asked entrants to consider the question of whether there should be a requirement of all U.S. citizens to perform mandatory public service, and if so, what form such service might take.
The contest was open to all full-time undergraduate students. Essays were to be roughly 1,000 words in length and were evaluated based upon clarity, overall quality of writing, and depth and breadth of analysis of the ideas presented in Quigley’s lecture and the supplemental material.
The College of Liberal Arts and the Center for Civic Leadership and Public Service jointly funded the contest. First prize was $1,000, the first runner-up received $600 and the second runner-up received $400.
The winners were: first prize – Barbara Cissell, a Nutrition major from Chicago; second prize – Melissa Quinn Meyer, the daughter of Patricia Meyer of Schaumburg and a junior majoring in Psychology; and third prize – Elizabeth George, the daughter of Floyd and Ellen George of Yorkville and a senior majoring in Business and Economics.
Honorable mention went to Joy Holowicki, the daughter of Anthony Holowicki of Franklin Park and Gayle Holowicki of Schiller Park and a senior majoring in Biochemistry/Molecular Biology; and Ivana Sreckov, the daughter of Lazar and Nevenka Sreckov of Darien and a junior majoring in International Business and Economics.
The Woodrow Wilson Visiting Fellows program, which is administered by the Council of Independent Colleges (CIC) in Washington, D.C., brings prominent artists, diplomats, journalists, business leaders and other professionals to campuses across the United States for a week-long residential program of classes, seminars, workshops, lectures and informal discussions.

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Benedictine University is an independent Roman Catholic institution located in Lisle, Illinois just 25 miles west of Chicago. Founded in 1887, Benedictine provides 56 undergraduate majors, 16 graduate and four doctorate programs. The Chronicle of Higher Education recently ranked Benedictine University as the seventh fastest-growing campus among private nonprofit master’s universities, and Forbes magazine named Benedictine among the top 20 percent of America’s colleges for 2011. Benedictine University’s Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.) program is listed by Crain’s Chicago Business as the fourth largest in the Chicago area in 2011.